If you got in a taxi in New York City between 1997 and 2003, you were greeted with the recorded voice of a celebrity reminding you to buckle up. When you left, the same celebrity reminded you to make sure you don’t forget anything, and get a receipt. These are the only known recordings of these messages, and include alternate outtakes that were not used.
The celebrity recordings were placed in taxis in rotating batches. The recordings of the fourth batch of celebrities is lost. They were Bernadette Peters, Charles Osgood, Chris Rock, Dick Clark, Judges Judy and Jerry Sheindlin, Montel Williams, Vinny Testaverde, Walt “Clyde” Frazier, and Yo-Yo Ma.
There is actually one bad copy of Chris Rock’s exit message, which is included in this collection but has a lot of background noise.
Also included is Victoria Drakoulis, the Queens woman who could be heard in taxis before the switch to celebrities.
You can watch an in-depth oral history of the Celebrity Talking Taxi program at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wJnOR3F3Iwk
And you can read the written oral history at https://ironicsans.substack.com/p/a-celebrity-in-every-taxi
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